Updates

Just wanted to give a few updates on recent posts...

Outside Kitty is still MIA. He has never been gone for this long so we're assuming the worst. We've not decided on exactly what to do but we do feel like we should do a little memorial service of some sort to remember his presence with us and bring closure. He was a loving cat and we miss him.

My Gram is doing better. She's been in a rehabilitation center for the past couple of weeks, getting stronger and recovering from whatever it was that caused her decline. If all goes well, she will be discharged on Tuesday and will be able to go home. My cousin, Esteban, is moving back from Los Angeles to live with and help care for her as it has been determined that she can no longer live alone. My aunt and uncle (apparently my father has not provided any input or support...go figure!) have agreed to pay Esteban a salary for his commitment, time and work. He is excited for this opportunity and is planning to start a blog to share old family stories, recipes, etc. as told by Gram. I am so grateful that he is in a place in his life that he can drop his ties in L.A. and move back to NM to spend this time with Gram. I'm also secretly and selfishly grateful that he will be only 3-1/2 hours away, although I am sad that we never got to make a family trip to CA to visit him there.

We drove by the ice sculptures today. Well, we drove by what is left of the ice sculptures. The buffalo is still standing but the horse has collapsed and the bear is now headless. Such a shame that these pieces of art did not last very long. The temperatures were in the mid 50's this weekend, nice for being outdoors, but not conducive to ice sculptures. The weather forecast is for 3-5 inches of snow and colder temperatures this week. I feel fairly confident that the temperatures will cool down but, as for the snow...I'll believe it when I see it!

Hangin' Out with 3rd Graders

Jamie's class went to downtown Alamosa for a field trip yesterday. They went to see the ice sculptures and to drink hot cocoa at Milagro's. The weather in Alamosa has been unseasonably warm and half of the ice sculptures, the ones on the north side of Main Street, are already gone after only 10 days. I'm glad that I stopped last Monday night and snapped photos of them all with lights or I would not have seen the deer sculpture at all.

The sculptures on the south side of the street are in the shade most of the day but, they too, are showing signs of melting. The little buffalo that was on top of the big one is gone. I don't know if it melted or if someone took it. The grizzly bear also has a hole in it's neck where the ice is already melting.

At Milagro's, we drank yummy hot cocoa and talked about the sculptures. When we got back to school, the kids had to write about the sculptures. It was overcast, cold and even snowing for the hour or so that we were out but, of course, the skies were clear and the sun shining by the time school let out. Crazy Colorado weather!

Ice Sculptures at Night

I remembered to take my camera with me tonight so, after scrapbooking, I stopped downtown and took photos of all of the ice sculptures with lights. The thermometer at the bank said it was 32 degrees and my car thermometer said 33...way too warm for 10:00pm in the middle of January!

Sunrise, Sunset

Today was a beautiful January day, bookended by an amazing sunrise and a stunning sunset! I was taken with how far to the south the color extended! Both photos are taken looking toward the south, with San Antonio mountain in the background.

sunrise 7:00am

sunset 5:19pm

Ice Fest 2011

This weekend was the 2nd annual Ice Fest in Alamosa. Huge blocks of ice are set out in several locations on Main Street and are then carved by ice sculptors over the weekend. Last year the theme was Trains and this year the theme is Wildlife. We went in on Saturday morning to watch the process, from start to finish, of the bronco sculpture. It is pretty amazing what they can do with a chain saw and other tools.

At 10:27am, this was just a block of ice, with a pattern of a bucking bronco taped to one side.

Two sculptors, armed with chain saws started to work. It looked dangerous in that they each got awfully close to the others' chain saw blade in the process. One of the sculptors talked with the crowd about some of the tools they use and one comment he made was, "we usually have to modify most of our tools for use on ice...like, remove the safety features". Yikes!! Bill asked him if they still had all their fingers under their gloves and he said, "no"! I don't know if he was kidding.

Here, he is using an iron to heat a portion of the ice so he can add another small block for the tail. Wonder what setting he uses?

Click to watch some video of the artist at work!

They also had to add another block of ice to the top for the ears. Instead of using the iron, they just poured water over it.

They also used chisels, wicked looking disc sanders and rotary die grinders to get all the fine details.

The finishing touch is to take a blow torch to the entire sculpture. This smooths out the edges and makes it crystal clear.

After 2 hours and 22 minutes, here is the finished project at 12:49pm.

There are supposed to be a total of 6 ice sculptures and 3 snow sculptures. Only 2 of the other ice sculptures were completed when we were downtown, the bird and the trout. They were getting ready to start the buffalo after they finished with the bronco. I heard that there will also be a bear. The cool thing (pun intended!) is that Alamosa is typically one of the coldest spots in the nation and these works of art will hang around for a good month or two. We have been having unusually mild temperatures this winter, though, so they did put some insulation around the sculptures on the north side of the street. They add lights to the sculptures for night display and I'm hoping to take my camera in one evening and get some shots of all of the sculptures with the lights.

This is the beginnings of one of the snow sculptures. The artist said that it was originally going to be a penguin on an inter-tube but that he was having a hard time because the snow was so soft. I'll have to get a follow up photo of this as well.

Alamosa is a small town but we do have a lot of little things like this Ice Fest to get the community out to mix and mingle. We really do love living here!

Getting Healthy

So, like most people, one of my New Year's resolutions is to get healthy. I've been a slacker lately, especially since my knee surgery. The holidays were especially brutal, I don't think I've ever eaten as much in a two week period as I did this past Christmas break! Combine all of those holiday calories with NO activity and...yep, my jeans are a little snug!

I'm not one who "believes" in dieting, you know, the counting of calories and such. I never weigh myself and I gauge my fitness on how well my clothes fit. I've always been active, though, and didn't have to worry about it much. There was one time, in my college days when I was playing an insane amount of volleyball and living in sweats or other elastic waist-ed items of clothing, that my weight dropped a significant amount without me realizing it. I was shocked, as I was preparing for a backpacking trip, to step on the scales (with my fully loaded backpack) and weigh less than my previously known weigh-in sans backpack.

I also had significant weight loss in the early stages of my Chronic Fatigue and Immune Dysfunction (CFIDS) diagnosis. This was mostly due to the fact that when faced with the choice of food or sleep, I always chose sleep. I was still working full-time and trying to figure out what the heck was wrong with me and, again, I never weighed myself but my clothes were hanging off of me and I looked like a skeleton. I think I was a size 4 at that point.

Suffice it to say that I am no longer a size 4. Not that I'd ever want to be that size again as I don't think that was a healthy size for me either.

My goal for 2011 is to get healthy. I want to make conscious food and exercise choices that affect my overall well-being. I'm going to start with cutting back on food portion sizes and implementing daily exercise and see how it goes. I'll re-evaluate in a couple of months and see if I need to step it up and actually do the calorie counting thing. I have a good friend who did Weight Watcher's last year, not that she had tons of weight to lose but she wanted to eat healthier and exercise more, and she looks amazing!

And so...as my first step towards a more healthy lifestyle, I enjoyed only ONE piece of this scrumptious butter braid treat for breakfast, instead of inhaling half of it! Gotta start somewhere, right?

Look What I Got For Christmas!

Bill and I decided to not exchange Christmas gifts this past year.
Bill has also been wanting a small camera of his own that he could carry in his pocket or fanny pack to use when he goes somewhere that maybe I'm not going with my camera. My camera is too big to be considered portable and he just wanted something that would take better pictures than his cell phone. So, when I found this little Panasonic camera on sale for nearly half off, I couldn't resist! I struggled with how to tell Bill that I had gotten him a Christmas present, in spite of our agreement, because I didn't want him to feel obligated to have to get me something.

I thought and I thought, and then I had a clever idea! I would also buy something for me, something that I'd been wanting but couldn't really justify spending the money for, and wrap up both items to put under the tree. See, Bill and I did not exchange gifts but SANTA brought each of us a little something! Clever, right?

My Santa gift was this stylish camera bag and I love it! It's a camera bag that doesn't look like a camera bag! It also has extra room inside for other items and lots of pockets on the outside. When I travel, I usually stick my driver's license and credit card inside my camera bag instead of carrying a purse and camera bag. With this bag, there's room for my entire wallet and, it looks (and feels) more like a purse than a camera bag.

Gram

Gram on New Year's Day 2011

My cousin, Esteban, called me this morning to let me know that my Gram is in the hospital again. I'm not surprised because when we were at her house on New Year's Day, she really did not look very good. She first went to the hospital on December 11 because she thought she had had a stroke. Turns out that her symptoms (dizziness, confusion) were caused by a bladder infection and that she didn't have a stroke. Whew! They kept her a couple of days for observation, treated the UTI, and ran some other tests, which all came back negative. She went home on the 13th and looked like she was feeling better when we saw her on the 21st. She celebrated her 94th birthday on December 22. Esteban took her to various doctor appointments while he was home from Los Angeles over Christmas Break. She was put on oxygen on Dec. 30 and had more tests run, including one to check the veins (arteries?) in her neck. Esteban left to go back to L.A. on Jan. 1 so his brother has been staying with her at her house since then. I don't know all of the details but, apparently, Gram has suddenly become violent and belligerent; accusing everyone of trying to kill her by withholding her medications. She's convinced she has pneumonia and that everyone is keeping her antibiotics away from her. Yesterday, my uncle was asked to spend the afternoon with Gram while Chuck went to work and he reluctantly agreed. I guess that was when Gram convinced him to take her to the ER. They did chest x-rays, urinalysis, blood tests (CBC) to check for pneumonia or ANY type of infection and everything came back negative. They are still waiting for the results on her neck veins...maybe she has some blockage that is causing her symptoms? Esteban mentioned an Alzheimer's diagnosis, which I am finding hard to believe. From our experience with Bill's mom and from what little research we've done online, Alzheimer's does not have a sudden onset. Esteban also said that his mom talked with Aunt Bernice's (Gram's sister) daughter and learned that, supposedly, Bernice had the same type of onset and she died about a year later. Weird! I don't know what's wrong with Gram, but something is definitely not right. In the meantime; Wanda, Charles and my father have the task of making decisions for her care after she is released from the hospital. I'd feel SO much better if Esteban was making those decisions, especially since my uncle and father haven't had anything to do with Gram for at least 3 years. It's pretty pathetic that my uncle lives 5 miles away and Gram has to wait until Esteban comes in from L.A. to take her to her doctor appointments. But, both Charles and my father have "issues" with Esteban and they would be completely pissed off if he stepped in and made decisions, even though they don't have a freakin' clue. Idiots!
My Gram is a feisty woman; stubborn, strong-willed and resilient. She has fought back from tougher things than this. It was sad, though, to see her so weak and vulnerable on New Year's Day. I realize that she can't live forever (although I do have my own theories about that!) and that I'm lucky to still have her in my life at the age of 94. I've been thinking about her all day today and especially about those yummy Stack Cookies she makes! I hope that the medical staff can figure out what's wrong very soon.

Outside Kitty

We have a hard time keeping cats out here where we live. Especially if they like to go outside...I think they become coyote or owl food and just disappear without a trace. So, when we discovered a cat hanging out under our house in 2004, we tried to not get too attached to him. He was real timid, at first, but by the end of the summer, this cat would come up to us and rub against us for attention. We determined that he had been neutered and it was obvious that he had been someone's pet at some point. Still, we didn't get attached. We didn't even feed him for a long time but he seemed determined to make our house his home and he also seemed to have figured how to escape the peril that all of our other cats had met. Jamie was 2 or 3 when we decided it was time to name this cat and his name became Outside Kitty. He has been a faithful fixture here for over six years now.

So, it's more than a little bit concerning that we haven't seen Outside Kitty since we've been home. We had a friend coming over to feed Outside Kitty while we were gone and he said that he hadn't seen Outside Kitty since about a week before we got home. Jamie hasn't said anything to me yet. I don't know if he hasn't realized it yet or if he thinks that something bad has happened to Outside Kitty and he doesn't want to talk about it. Outside Kitty has disappeared before, for a day or so, but always has come back. I hope he's found a warm place to bide his time and will come home soon.

Happy 2011

Happy 1-1-11!!

Here's all of us before we loaded up and started on our journey home.

We left Mesa yesterday and made it to Albuquerque last night. We decided to not risk going up through Payson, as those roads were all restricted to chains or 4WD, and drove I-17 to I-40 instead. It's further if you go that way but I don't think it takes any longer because you have higher speed limits. The roads in and around Flagstaff were wet & slushy, but clear & dry for the rest of Arizona. In New Mexico, though, we ran into some snowpack and icy roads from the state line to Grants. Apparently, New Mexico believes in the "au natural" method of snow removal. Oh well, we made it safe and sound.

We got into Rio Rancho at 9:30pm, stopped at Walgreen's for party hats and noise makers, picked up a movie at Redbox and then settled in to wait for the arrival of the new year. We watched "How to Train Your Dragon" and then, at 11:50pm, switched on the TV to watch Dick Clark and the ball drop at midnight. Jamie was SO excited to get to stay up until midnight!!

We spent the first day of 2011 being lazy! We watched the Rose Parade and the Outback Bowl and then went to Julie's Gram's house to visit and watch the Rose Bowl game. Owen, Chuck, Brian and Tyler were there too and Sharon showed up right as we were leaving, so we got to see a few people that we would normally see at Christmas. Gram was not feeling well and, even though she was sitting in the living room with us, she slept for most of the time we were there. We got back to the house in time to get Jamie to bed on time tonight and Bill just left to go to Cold Stone with Billy. I asked him to bring something back for me...we'll see if he remembers!

Another Year is Coming to an End (Where Did the Time Go?)

Wow!! Is it REALLY the end of another year?? 2010 just flew by...especially the past four months! I remember I was planning on having LOTS of down time in October after having knee surgery. The surgeon said, beforehand, to expect 6-8 weeks of no weight bearing following the surgery. I had that down time all planned...I was going to catch up on the blog, work on scrapbooks, read, watch lots of movies... I guess it's a good thing that the surgery went better than expected and that I had no weight bearing restrictions AT ALL! Basically, the surgery was just a blip on the screen and October came and went and I didn't get anything on my "to-do" list done. But, my knee is good, it feels better than it has in YEARS!!!

Again, I am going to try to blog more regularly because it does help me when it comes time to journal in my scrapbooks. And since I'm not good at doing the whole "Christmas letter" thing, I hope that some folks check in every once in a while to see that we're still alive and kickin'.

So, to catch up (AGAIN!), here are a few photos of the happenings/activities that have kept our family busy for the past four months.

Knee Surgery (Friday, October 8, 2010)

I had outpatient arthroscopic knee surgery in Colorado Springs. Bill & I drove up the night before and Jamie stayed home with grandma. Surgery started at 12:30pm and I was in the car, heading home, by 3:30. No weight bearing restrictions, didn't even send me home with crutches! We had a walker that a neighbor left after a garage sale so I used that to get around for a couple of days but was walking by Monday. Dr. Mahoney rocks!!

this pic is taken 4 days post-op...teeny, tiny incisions & no stitches!

Jamie colored this picture for me as a get well card! Isn't he sweet??

Tour of new elementary schools (Friday, October 15, 2010)

The new schools are almost finished! They were initially supposed to be ready for occupancy by December 2010 but the district decided to hold off on the move until summer break. Jamie and the other Boyd ambassadors got to tour the school and then made a presentation to the parent/teacher organization. He is excited to attend the new school and he had three favorite things: the hand dryers, the fact that the lunch room & gymnasium are separate, and the cool playground equipment.

lunch room/multi-purpose room

gymnasium/auditorium

library

common area

upstairs/hallway/teacher's lounge

classroom

boys restroom with power hand dryers...they also have sinks & hand dryers in the lunch room, which makes ALL kinds of sense!

outside

cool playground equipment

3rd Grade Field Trip to ASC Chemistry Magic Show (October 22, 2010)

Jamie's class walked to ASC from Boyd (almost 2 miles!) to attend the annual Chemistry Magic Show, put on by the ASC Chemistry department in celebration of National Chemistry Week. (Did you even know that there is such a thing as National Chemistry Week?) A parent of one of Jamie's classmates is a Chemistry professor, and the classmate was actually a part of the show. Professors & students perform many "magic" tricks and then open up the Chem Labs for kids to do some magic of their own. They made snow and also slime. I'm so impressed with all of the activities for kids that ASC provides!!

making slime

Church Bowling Night (October 30, 2010)

going for the spare...

...and he got it!

Market Day/Halloween

Jamie's class had Market Day on the morning of October 29. Jamie painted and decorated wooden pumpkins. Then, that afternoon, they changed into their Halloween costumes, walked over to the Food Bank with canned food donations and then came back to school for pizza, games & goodies. Jamie dressed up as a shark.

We have a yearly Halloween tradition of meeting at a friends house (who lives in town) for an easy & quick dinner and a group trick-or-treating adventure. Our numbers were lower this year than in past years but, it was still a good time!

AMAZING sunrise!! (November 19, 2010)

I don't remember WHY I was even awake at this time of the morning but, this sunrise was unbelievable!! Actually, I think the color coming in through my east facing bedroom window was so bright that it woke me up!

Crazy Hair Day (November 30, 2010)

Basketball (November & December 2010)

Jamie had a great basketball season. His coach was great and taught a lot of basic basketball skills. The entire team improved over the season and Jamie really learned & improved so much!

3rd Grade Winter/Christmas Program (December 7, 2010)

This years program was organized and well performed, quite different from the usual marching in and out of individual classes with lots of lag time. A few students acted out a play about searching for Christmas and everyone else (combined 3rd grade classes) sang songs in between scenes. Jamie's best friend, Parker, stole the show!!

Pre-Christmas Activities (December 2010)

Pre-Christmas activities included decorating gingerbread houses, caroling, performing in the Christmas program at church and visiting St. Nick and Santa.

he told Santa that he wanted a phone and a laptop...ha! ha!

Christmas in Arizona

We left Alamosa on December 21st and spent the night in Albuquerque. We visited Julie's Gram (who celebrated her 94th birthday on Dec. 22) and cousin (who was visiting from Los Angeles) and then headed to Mesa on the 22nd. Grandma Betty waited for us to get there so that Jamie could help her put up & decorate her outside tree. Since we knew that we were going to be gone, we decided to not decorate at home. I was going to go ahead and decorate because I thought that Jamie might feel bad if we didn't, but it was actually his idea to not decorate..."why should we do all of that work if we're not even going to be here for Christmas?" At least he realizes that it does require some time & effort to decorate! He had fun helping grandma and the tree really turned out looking great! On the 23rd, we went to the Mesa LDS Temple to see their spectacular light and nativity display. They also had live entertainment, which was fun. On Christmas Eve, we found a nice church service at First United Methodist Church of Gilbert and then meandered home looking at Christmas lights. It wasn't like driving through Old Town or Lee Acres (in Albuquerque) and seeing the fabulous luminarias, but it was still nice. If we do Christmas in Arizona again, we'll have to do more research and learn where to find the cool light displays.

It was easy to get Jamie to bed on Christmas Eve...he still believes in Santa and the magic of the season. It is so awesome to experience Christmas with a child!! We told him that he couldn't wake us up any earlier than 7:00 on Christmas morning and he was in our room at 7 o'clock on the dot! Grandma is usually an early riser but when she wasn't up and around by 7:30, we sent Jamie to knock on her door. She had woken up at 6:00 and then fallen back to sleep! There's nothing like the excitement of a kid at Christmas and Jamie had great fun. It was his idea, though, to do the gifts one at a time so we could see what everyone got. We started out going one gift per person but quickly realized that Jamie had waaaaay more gifts under tree so he got to open 2 or 3 for each one that everyone else opened. We all made quite a haul!

Jamie's pile of Christmas treasures all laid out on the table...I think he also had a pile on a nearby chair!

Our time in Arizona has been so relaxing! We've been lazy and have eaten ourselves stupid! The weather has been really nice until the past day or so. It rained all day yesterday so we went to IKEA, saw Yogi Bear in 3D and ate at Oregano's. There's a cold breeze today and it's supposedly snowing like crazy in northern Arizona, New Mexico & Colorado. AZDOT says that all roads in northern AZ are closed. We are leaving to drive back to Albuquerque tomorrow and still trying to figure out the best (safest) route.

And, so...another year winds down...I really still can't believe how fast 2010 went by! Life is good in the Brooks' household. We're looking forward to all that 2011 has in store!